Author: admin_poj

From my conversations in London, Paris and this month, in Kigali as well as the talks at events from Los Angeles to Hong Kong, there has been a topic that keeps coming up. The conversations have been wide-ranging and complex as we tackled what transformation look like (and should look like) at everything from the personal to the global scale.

But the conversations keep returning to people, and specifically capability building. At its core, this is about trust. It’s about finding the right people to come on a journey with you, trusting them to do their part with passion and integrity; but also trusting them to keep honing their growth mindset so that they have the skills they need, even in testing times. It’s also about them trusting you and buying into what you are trying to do. For this, your communications skills need to be meticulous – clarity is everything – but you also need a healthy dose of self-awareness to make sure you are questioning your own decisions.

In this video, I got to the heart of the issue. 

I had never really thought of all transformations as fragile. I know that many fail. As McKinsey reported, 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail to meet their objective. The cost is staggering. The Financial Times shared: “Globally, failed transformation efforts cost businesses an estimated $2.3tn a year.” Despite this, I had held the view that this was because many companies are making the same mistakes – poor execution, lack of a compelling narrative and not viewing a transformation as a continuum of capability building – stopping the work when there is always more work to be done. The transformation itself could be robust if handled differently. 

“Globally, failed transformation efforts cost businesses an estimated $2.3tn a year.”

It was my conversation with Ambroise Depouilly, Managing Partner (CEO) of Deloitte Francophone Africa, which added a new and valuable perspective. He spoke of transformations as fragile. Speaking from his own experience, he shared: “A big transformation project can fail just by one person not being engaged or being against the project. I think that the role of an external advisor is constantly seeking for weak signals and being prepared to take courageous decisions when it’s needed.”  I have seen this myself. 

Being human

This stance is so powerful because it almost imbues a transformation with human qualities, which you must then be mindful of. After all, there is more at play than data and KPIs. There are also human emotions, including fear, empathy, excitement, nervousness and anger sometimes. Being aware of this means you will be more sensitive to these signals that Ambroise talked about and therefore can act before something breaks. 

“If you have the mindset that recognises that transformation is fragile, even when it’s going well, you are aware that things can quickly switch. It just keeps you engaged.”

Ambroise admits he learnt the hard way. He told me: “I recall a very large project. It was a multi-year and multi-million dollar project. There was just one person who wasn’t on board. When this person left the project, all of a sudden the project changed. It was just one person, and I wondered afterwards why I didn’t identify this. I was quite young and I didn’t realise that a project is fragile.” This mindset shift means that he is now acutely aware of the details, including how colleagues are engaging. “If you have the mindset that recognises that transformation is fragile, even when it’s going well, you are aware that things can quickly switch. It just keeps you engaged.”

Listen, listen and listen again

As well as changing mindset, he also realised that you have to listen. Author Travis Bradberry wrote a brilliant post a few months ago about how words reveal your EQ “in an instant”. He shared phrases that exemplify just this, stating: “Most people think emotional intelligence is about what you feel. It’s not. It’s about what you say when it matters most. Pressure. Conflict. Mistakes. Feedback. These are 

the moments that define how people experience you. And in those moments, most people default to instinct. High performers don’t. They use language that creates clarity instead of tension…ownership instead of defensiveness…and trust instead of distance.”

Silence is golden

But I would add silence to this list. Sometimes, you need to say nothing at all. This is right from that first meeting with a client to find out what they need from the transformation. That’s how you discover what the drivers are and what’s at stake. You then use this information to build the team and shape the project. As Ambroise told me: “That is how to make sure you find the right people – the right expertise with the right communication skills.” And keep listening – to views, to ideas and to concerns. 

“If you listen first, you can then apply your skills where they are needed as opposed to trying to enforce your framework and views in an ever-changing scenario.”

“When you start your career as a young expert, you come with your methodology, with your science, and you try to apply it. But then, time after time, you realise that every transformation is so different,” he added. If you listen first, you can then apply your skills where they are needed as opposed to trying to enforce your framework and views in an ever-changing scenario.  

From fragile to resilient

When the team is no longer coming to you, then the transformation has become resilient enough for you to step back. As Ambroise explained, the ultimate goal for the external advisor is that everything you have put into place is working – the chassis is sturdy, the drivers know the route, the passengers are happy and the transformation is moving steadily forward on its own. At this point, you hope too that it is no longer fragile but sturdy enough to not break down even if the road becomes bumpy. This will only happen if you have listened to every stakeholder along the way, including your own intuition.  

I don’t deny that there will be some factors that are beyond your control; but this conversation confirmed to me that good, clear, concise and emotionally-intelligent communication is absolutely essential in all business interaction, but especially during the pressure of a transformation. It won’t stop blocks appearing in the road, but it might mean you can swerve them and not end up like the thousands of ventures smouldering and crumpled in the lay-by. 

It’s building trust even when it’s being undermined

This month has been about macro framing. I took a step back and leaned into a conversation with a world economics professor to get a view on how the transformations we are seeing across the corporate world are being impacted by wider transformations in society. 

This is a huge subject. It takes in everything from the deterioration of trust in institutions; globalisation and the role of business in society. It was also a conversation that took place before bombs started falling across even more Middle Eastern nations and a world that was already turbulent became a maelstrom. 

Comfort in continuity

What I took away was comfort that there will be some continuity; but it needs to be a choice. You might now be rolling your eyes in disbelief but bear with me. 

One of the central tenets of transformation for me has been that if you focus on the Four I’s of Economic Transformation – Investment, Institutions, Infrastructure and Innovation – and get them embedded into the ground, you can build sustainably. 

“…The pillars of fiscal consolidation, and renewed macroeconomic credibility are setting the stage for a more stable and attractive investment landscape.”

Only this month, I delved into PwC’s West African Economic Outlook report and I circled in red comments by partner George Arhin who had honed in on Ghana. He wrote that the country is charting a path to recovery and as it does so, “…the pillars of fiscal consolidation, and renewed macroeconomic credibility are setting the stage for a more stable and attractive investment landscape.” This is economic theory seen in action; and it is working. 

The challenges of the past

There’s no denying, though, that it was a very different world when INSEAD Professors Antonio Fatás and Ilian Mihov wrote the paper on this in 2009. However, it wasn’t a world without problems. In fact, we were in the grip of the Global Financial Crisis. As Bank Underground succinctly described it: “…the GFC was by far the deepest global downturn that has occurred in the post-war period.  Indeed, so far, 2009 has been the only year since World War II in which world activity contracted relative to the previous year.” So is it still relevant? 

Who better to ask than Professor Fatás himself and he offered hope. “I think to a large extent that model is still valid. Like any framework, it is obviously a large simplification of lots of things which are very complex. When you talk about growth of a country or a company, there are lots of issues that one cannot summarise in a slide”, he shared. However, he adds: “…the idea was to highlight factors, which are fundamental and which sometimes we ignore. If we go through a list of bullet points of what matters, the list gets longer and longer. We then don’t see clearly what blocks truly matter.”

Changing consensus

What has changed, he acknowledges, is consensus on what each of the Four I’s actually are. We still have institutions, for example, but the past few years have tested their relevance or revealed gaping chasms in the views of which are relevant at all. Look at the Trump Administration’s battering of the United Nations; and at a corporate level, the move away by some businesses from DEI initiatives that many of us believed were completely embedded. The very nature of governance has been questioned. 

“Africa is paying too much to borrow. Calls to end the “Africa premium” – the gap between how Africa is assessed and the reality of its economies – can no longer be ignored.”

It’s not all negative though. It might force positive transformation. In an op-ed in the Financial Times, Bola Tinubu, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, called for the establishment of an Africa-owned credit rating agency. “Africa is paying too much to borrow. Calls to end the “Africa premium” – the gap between how Africa is assessed and the reality of its economies – can no longer be ignored,” he declared. 

The current model is not working – it is opaque and subjective – and the institutions that have held sway for decades are not fit for purpose, he said, stating: “Fitch, Moody’s and S&P Global Ratings, the three dominant global credit rating agencies, wield outsized influence over Africa’s access to international capital. Their judgments shape investor behaviour, yet they consistently misjudge African risk.”

Africa owning Africa’s narrative

Transformation is needed and this would mean a move away from the “Big Three” for the continent, which would instead have its own credit rating agency. He writes: “When prices fall or markets tighten, African nations are downgraded swiftly and broadly – even when their reserves are strong, fiscal buffers are intact and debt profiles remain manageable. Downgrades then become self-fulfilling, raising borrowing costs and straining public finances.” 

The “Big Three”, he added, would still be used by international investors for validation but the new agency could change investor perceptions of the continent. It would, as I have called for before, let the continent control its own narrative. 

There will be many who disagree. However, everyone must acknowledge that the value of certain institutions is being questioned. There are discordant views now. As Professor Fatás surmised, it may have been that these views have always been held but now business (and political) leaders are not holding back (for better or worse). 

In spite of all of this turbulence, business leaders can choose to steer a steady path. I don’t mean refuse to acknowledge that transformation is necessary. That is a path to destruction. But they can choose to remain true to their values, cultivate trust and set an example to their employees and clients alike. 

“Surely now is the time for business leaders to proudly model behaviour that will trickle down; and hopefully even defy gravity to flood up too.”

I wrote earlier this week that business don’t exist in a vacuum. They play a key societal role – and not just financially or structurally. As a business leader, I want people to know what I stand for. I am guided by my desire to connect people and bring about remarkable but sustainable transformation; but I am also steadfastly guided by my faith and my compass as a father, husband and global citizen. 

People need to trust me as we work together to transform businesses. I need to earn and maintain that trust, which I do by constantly learning, developing my EQ and questioning my decisions. Surely now is the time for business leaders to proudly model behaviour that will trickle down; and hopefully even defy gravity to flood up too.